Talk:Genocide

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Hard/Soft genocide

The offical definition of genocide seems very vague, i.e. it might include

• Welsh schoolchildren forced to speak English and beaten if they don't
• any siege (where dead animals or starvation is used to wear down the city dwellers)
• neglect of POWs
• flower wars
• the killing of Saxons by Charlemagne (which would cost them a generation but was not intended to wipe out an ethnicity)

I think that renders the term pretty much meaningless. The above examples have nothing to do with "typical" examples like the biblical slaughter of the Amalekites commanded by Samuel which Saul refused.

Falun Gong

Should we include Jiang Zemin's persecution of Falun Gong practitioners? Like, does that count as genocide?Serocco (talk) 05:39, 24 April 2014 (UTC)

Well, after a quick glance at that other wiki, I'd say their treatment would come under Article 6(c) of the Rome Statute, "Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part." I think the main problem would be trying to define Falun Gong as a "religious group" as required by that Article. But if Buddhism = religion, then I think Falun Gong probably is as well. Do you have any reputable sources referring to it as a genocide? Pascal yuiop (talk) 07:44, 25 April 2014 (UTC)

China Uncensored considers it genocide, and they have very extensive research about just how bad it gets. They even name names, like Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang as some of the worst offenders of this persecution. A judge in Argentine considers it genocide. A couple of American Congressmen referred to it as a genocide while denouncing the organ harvesting practices of the CCP. Serocco (talk) 04:04, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Maybe write something about genocide in the RW Falun Gong article first, then have it linked from here? Nullahnung (talk) 09:36, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Oh, they have their own article? Good idea. Serocco (talk) 05:29, 27 April 2014 (UTC)

Disputed cases

Both examples given of disputed cases given in the page are actually largely undisputed cases that no-one considers to be genocide apart froma few fringe extremists. By contrast, some of those listed as full examples are genuinely disputed cases. FullMetalJacobin (talk) 00:31, 17 August 2014 (UTC)

Which ones? Alec Sanderson (talk) 23:51, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

I'd say that East Timor, the Holodomor, the Ainu and the Native American tragedy, and possibly more, are all academically disputed enough for us to classify them as such. (Just to clarify by the way, this isn't my opinion - I'd argue that all of the above except East Timor were indeed genocides, but I do think there is significant enough disagreement on them.) FullMetalJacobin (talk) 14:24, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for that. Alec Sanderson (talk) 13:39, 18 August 2014 (UTC)

War in the Vendée

I think it's important to preface my comments, however short they might be, with a statement of position, as the War in the Vendée has been co-opted by extremist Catholics both in France, and the United States, as a platform to rave about atheist genocide. Granted, the Vendée rebels probably meet the standard of extremists themselves standard by modern measure, but that's neither here nor there. I am a lapsed-Catholic atheist, and don't wish to use the Vendée as a platform to decry the supposed evils of my lack of faith. That stated, I am not certain how it does not meet the standards of a genocide as set by the U.N. From their website;

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

• Killing members of the group
• Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group
• Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part
• Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group
• Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

I was shocked by how broad this definition was, but if it's the one to go by then the Republican reaction to the Royalist uprising in the Vendée is undeniably accountable. If we put aside the 'Republican Baptisms', and the persecution of Clergy, and frankly anyone that even slightly looked rebellious, the intent of the officers as conveyed in private writings, and in the orders issued by the committee of public safety, are chillingly clear. To quote from Wikipedia;

Under orders from the Committee of Public Safety in February 1794, the Republican forces launched their final "pacification" effort (named Vendée-Vengé or "Vendée Avenged"): twelve infernal columns under Louis Marie Turreau, marched through the Vendée.[48] General Turreau inquired about "the fate of the women and children I will encounter in rebel territory", stating that, if it was "necessary to pass them all by sword", he would require a decree.[36] In response, the Committee of Public Safety ordered him to "eliminate the brigands to the last man, there is your duty..."

There are also the (admittedly disputed) remarks of General Westermann, who supposedly wrote of how he had massacred the women, so they could bear no more brigands. It was the horrible policy, of either the commanders, or the committee of public safety (that is a blame game I don't think history will ever resolve), to reduce the civilian populace in the region to the degree it could no longer make war. The destruction wholesale of villages is well documented.

Whilst the Vendée being classified as a genocide is absolutely disputed, and deserves to remain in the disputed section, I don't feel that the commentary provided along with that listing is either neutral, nor fair to the topic discussed, and may bear revision to better reflect the true horror on display in the conflict, and it's resultant atrocities. ^{— Unsigned, by: 73.51.222.21 / talk / contribs}

Laundry list of genocides

So I am reading through WP's article on the various genocides throughout history and various scholars. Some of these genocides are widely accepted but may fit the criteria. These are the genocides include, the Dersim Massacre committed by Turkey, considered a genocide by İsmail Beşikçi, the Tamil genocide, considered a genocide by Francis Boyle, the genocide of West Papuans committed by Indonesia, the Stolen Generations committed by Australia, considered a genocide by Ronald Wilson, the Biharis and Chakmas genocides by Bangladesh, the Dzungar Genocide committed by the Qing Dynasty in China, the 1804 Haiti massacre, and the Palestinian genocide committed by Israel. I have also found that Operation Lentil, the mass deportation of Chechens and Ingush, is considered a genocide by the European Parliament and the mass deportations of the Crimean Tatars is considered a genocide by the Ukranian government; I was curious if these are considered a part of Stalin's Great Purge. Also, I have found that various riots are considered genocidal, such as the 1984 anti-Sikh riots in India and the Sabra and Shatila massacre, specifically by Ariel Sharon; I personally believe such acts should be listed on under pogroms but I am open to disagreement. (A short list of pogroms I will be using.)--Owlman (talk) (mail) 03:52, 26 September 2016 (UTC)

The Irish Famine

Why isn't it considered a genocide? I know that there was a real threat to the primary food source, potatoes, so it wasn't man made like the Holodomor and Bengal famine. Despite this, didn't Britain's neglect and forced work programs exacerbate the famine and death toll? Wouldn't such actions constitute a complicity in the suffering and an attempt at social control which would qualify as genocide?--Owlman (talk) (mail) 05:57, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Genocide implies intent; the general view is that it was entirely down to incompetence; blind faith in capitalism and the economy not being good enough to provide jobs other than farming. The famine issue all goes down to Connacht and Munster being entirely dependent on potato harvests due to being too rocky and boggy for wheat, and being too poor to buy food from elsewhere. The Peel and Russel governments tried various forms of relief to prevent a disaster, but failed. Peel tried smuggling in £100k of wheat from the US when repealing the protectionist Corn Laws failed. The Russel ministry was big on laissez-faire, so insisted that the poor would naturally get work at their local workhouses (run by their landlords) and be able to buy food and pay rent. They did open soup kitchens; bring in pointless public work schemes (e.g. roads to nowhere) and offer monetary support to farmers so they could buy English food, but individual efforts by MPs and civil servants to fix Ireland in their own laissez-faire way ruined it (soup kitchens closed down, and someone added a line to the money bill which basically meant you had to sell all but 1/4 acre of your (rented) land and thus lose your job to qualify). With all the mishandlings the poor failed to get adequate help from the state and were unable to buy in bulk the food that was readily available but which the collapsing economy rendered unaffordable. The Irish landlords in Connacht themselves also tried to solve the issue their own way, by investing fourfold in their Poor Law Unions in order to create new workhouses so their peasants could work and afford rent and food (eviction was a serious issue in Connacht, and you can imagine what being homeless in a famine would mean). Their own efforts to provide jobs still led to 100,000 deaths as disease spread in cramped conditions. In summary, the government did try a variety of ways to solve the problem but either lacked the power over Parliament to carry them out or they were just bad ideas.-- Forerunner (talk) 08:04, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

You certainly have a more in-depth knowledge of the famine than I do, and I appreciate that. I agree that there was a degree of incompetence but Russel's insistence on neglecting the poor by instituting free-market reforms that punished them was certainly deliberate. Charles Trevelyan refusal to hand out food while forcing the starving Irish into work camps that spread disease so that they could build useless public work projects in grueling conditions seems to obviously point to an intent to demoralize and destroy a populace; such a similar tactic occurred in Bengal, India in 1943 and most people accept that such an event was a genocide. Trevelyan also had extremely racist anti-Irish views and believed that the Christian God was punishing them which would show that he intended to eliminate them or, at least, their culture.--Owlman (talk) (mail) 08:29, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

We do a lot of Irish history in Liverpool. Trevelyan's belief of the Irish was based on his commitment to the Protestant Work Ethic; the PWE idea of the famine is basically an anti-Catholic allegation that the ungodly (read: not-Protestant) Connacht farmers died because they were so lazy and obsessed with beer they ran out of money to live on. The PWE ideal was pervasive enough (despite liberal figures like Gladstone, who was encouraging state-funded seminaries at the time) that it basically required public works schemes and workhouses to be the financial aid instead of handouts. Otherwise the government may have been unable to offer any help at all. There was a lot of ignorance though, since even some Irish politicians of the time were absentee landlords. -- Forerunner (talk) 09:50, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

Oh yeah - the revisionist view of the Hunger so I recall is basically "Britain is innocent of genocide but still looks guilty as fuck".-- Forerunner (talk) 10:01, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

I find it interesting that the mainstream revisionist view is one in which the Empire's racism and laissez-faire attitude was responsible but that it ultimately wasn't a genocide; I assumed that it was always held that the Empire had exacerbated the Famine but hadn't caused a genocide. From what I understand, the Brits were still exporting food from Ireland as a part of the agricultural "public" work programs that they forced the Irish to do. It would seem to me that if the British response was motivated by the PWE, and the PWE is inherently anti-Catholic, then the neglectful response by the British was motivated, in part, by view that the Irish Catholics could be removed through this starvation campaign; such an action seems to qualify as a genocide, especially after you tally up the amount of people who died as a result of the famine.--Owlman (talk) (mail) 03:01, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Just going to mention

...that bringing up the Irish potato famine as an absolute equivalent to the Holodomor is an apologist favorite of fractally wrong tankies. (Pssst — it's not) Reverend Black Percy (talk) 14:11, 9 December 2016 (UTC)

I am not trying to be harsh. I don't think you have been using "tankie" right and I don't know why you insist on using it at all. Tankie was meant to snarkily describe someone who whitewashed Stalin's imperialistic invasion of Hungary; later on, it was used to describe anyone who handwaved atrocities Stalin committed, like the Holodomor, while criticizing atrocities the West had committed. I didn't handwave Stalin's crimes nor did I say that the Famine was an absolute equivalent (my original statement was, "I know that there was a real threat to the primary food source, potatoes, so it wasn't man made like the Holodomor and Bengal famine."). Even if I did, I don't think there would have been anything wrong with such a comparison since tankies use the Famine as an attempt at whataboutery when discussing the Holodomor.--Owlman (talk) (mail) 02:42, 11 December 2016 (UTC)

Trimming the list of genocides

I think many of the crimes listed on this article do not qualify as genocides. According to Oxford historian Simon Payaslian: consensus has formed among scholars that genocides in the 20th century encompassed (although were not limited to) the following cases: Herero in 1904–1907, the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire in 1915–1923, the Holodomor in the former Soviet Ukraine in 1932–1933, the Jewish Holocaust in 1938–1945, Bangladesh in 1971, Cambodia in 1975–1979, East Timor in 1975–1999, Bosnia in 1991–1995, and Rwanda in 1994."[1]. Wikipedia also gives us a fairly smaller number of genocides through history, and even some of them are questionable, like the War in the Vendée. If no one opposes, I'll cut most of the list. GeeJayK (talk) 12:51, 20 June 2022 (UTC)

Payaslian (primarily a scholar of the Armenian genocide) doesn't seem to give a source for that being a "consensus", and the list is woefully incomplete (off the top of my head, Guatemala is an obvious one that was even ruled a genocide). At that point, it's better to just remove the section entirely. Plutocow (talk) 07:18, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

What was deliberately kept out of the genocide definition, because the definition of genocide was crafted by powers who were more than happy with political extermination, was an inclusion of politically targeted killings. If we include politicide in that equation, the deliberate extermination of political groups, I think you get a much bigger list. This would include the Indonesian mass killings and the Argentine Dirty War. I think the targeting of socialists in the Holocaust would also count here. Carthage (talk) 07:21, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

@Plutocow I'll re-add the section using the The Oxford handbook of Genocide Studies. I thought about using The Cambridge World History of Genocide trilogy too, but the first one has a table with a list of genocides in the 20th century, while the other doesn't. Tell me what you think once I'm done. GeeJayK^{Where all evil dwells} _{Where every lie is true} 18:19, 11 June 2024 (UTC)

Of course, as it cuts off at 2010, it's missing the Rohingya genocide, and while it's contentious the genocide investigations on Israel as a result of the Gaza war could also be added. Plutocow (talk) 19:56, 11 June 2024 (UTC)